Thursday, February 10, 2011

This is what you've been missing these cold, frigid, "I'm not going outside" nights recently. When it comes to layered haunting female vocal drone, Fursaxa is the QUEEN. I first got into her because she played in Acid Mothers Temple and someone commented that her solo recordings were similar and better than Nico's. This self-released CD on her own Sylph Records is a prime example. All the songs are pretty much composed entirely of by her voice with minimal instrumentation from keyboard, hand percussion, flute, and organ. It's seriously amazing how much of her voice she can squeeze into a four-track. Oh yeah and two of the songs are based on 'Flower Fairies of the Autumn' by Cicely Mary Barke. YEAH! GIRL DRONE ABOUT FAIRIES!!!

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

"Music is eternal; it is ahistorical. So says the polliwog. Music in time is Muzak: floating strains, the meaningless pap that provides the background soundtrack for other peoples lives. It lies behind those that have history, who are old. Like embarrassing cartoon music, this mush shows its age and, in an amusing way, provokes disgusted looks on the enfeebled listeners who are familiar with it, who once thought that it was impervious to cooption. How pathetic . . . to hear these once "hot" sounds demoted to punctuation for children's entertainments, to be made present again . . . but only for the pre-adolescent. This is what happened to Raymond Scott's "Powerhouse" when applied to Bugs Bunny, when Cab Calloway crooned along with Betty Boop, and even now when Jimi Hendrix, in his death, supplies the soundtrack for today's "adult toy" car commercial." - From Mike Kelly's liner notes

Destroy All Monsters 1974-1976 chronicles the early era of the group when they were self-professed "anti-rock". Untrained musicians unable to play a proper gig without audience unrest they intead played "guerilla style", plugging in and crashing parties. They never even released a proper album, this is private music for private protest. Sounds like some dirty detroit punkers wandered into delia derbyshire's studio and trashed the place. This three cd compilation was released in 1995 on ecstatic peace...probably the best accomplishment of Thurston Moore to date. Thirty-five years down the line, "Lust for Life" is in a car commercial and DAM still doesn't make any sense...love it. DAM=BESTDETROITBAND

Sunday, February 6, 2011

Recorded August 23, 2009The third of three performances recorded on handheld cassette in the basement of Dr Who's Warehouse of Ideas. Great feedbacky female howling. I don't think Katarina has performed in over a year and there were rumors of two new cassettes. In the meantime, many more Penelope Unity live bootlegs to come.

Recorded August 23, 2009The second of three performances recorded on handheld cassette in the basement of Dr Who's Warehouse of Ideas. Poetry reading as the main event for a show! This was following the release of Linh Dinh's sixth book, "Some Kind of Cheese Orgy." He was also promoting his photoblog State of the Union, a visual commentary on our current state of depression. The picture of El is a Sound of Joy in my previous post is from his blog. Give it to Brooks Johnson and the folks at Dr Who's for instilling culture into us heathens.

"Imagine a concoction that mixes Shakespeare's Falstaff and Celine's Bardum, frank, rollicking humor and hair raising disgust. After adding fish sauce, a smelly cheese and sexual sweat, shake vigorously. Out of the bottle rises Linh Dinh. God talks to him and he talks about everything, including the body parts that Renaissance painters left out. No one does it better." - John Yau

Recorded August 23, 2009The first of three performances recorded on handheld cassette in the basement of Dr Who's Warehouse of Ideas. I don't really know how to talk about El is a Sound of Joy except that they are one of the best improvisational groups I have ever seen and one of my favorite Chicago bands. I enjoy this recording because Ritwik is laaaaaying it down on sax. A relatively short set by El. But then again I had to cut the last six minutes because my cassette recorder completely fuzzed out. What's up with my tape recorder skipping too? Sounds good though righ??

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